can put a two-man team out when your Moore gets back to his hotel. More than that, bejases, and I'll have to go to the top with it. With your scalp tied to my belt, for fear they'll be wanting one.'
Kenyon was half-way into a salmon sandwich when Bowers swivelled from the monitor.
'Memo for you, sir. A Code Three. Do you want a hard copy or just screen-read?'
Kenyon swallowed a mouthful of sandwich. He had never warmed to the use of terminals for internal mail, especially for any messages higher than a Code One. Despite assurances and performance evaluations of the system proving that the network was secure, despite the best efforts of simulated hostile 'breakers,' Kenyon retained his dislike of having something which reminded him of a television in his office. Reluctantly, he walked to the terminal and keyed in his code to retrieve the message.
'Print it, yes,' he said to Bowers and returned to his chair. The jagged tearing sound of the printer lasted less than a minute.
'Second telephone inquiry on a flagged name with the LMP, sir. They've had an alert on the name since Monday, authorized by you.'
'Yes, I know. Go on,' Kenyon said.
'To Inspector Newman, by name, from police in Dublin re Arthur Combs… Wanted more detailed bio on that party. For attention of one Sergeant Minogue, sir. The copper you wanted to know about, that's him-'
Kenyon felt his heart race. The police in Dublin had twigged to something? He pressed fingers into his eyes, rubbed, then held them against his eyelids.
'That's it, sir.'
Kenyon needed to clear his throat. He gently placed the remains of the sandwich on his desk. It could mean that the Irish police were just becoming frustrated and hoped that a detail missing from their previous picture of Combs might help. Yes: if they had found any bombshell left by Combs, why hadn't a real storm erupted? Had their police handed it over to their Foreign ministry and were they sitting on it, at a loss to evaluate it? The ex-head of MI5, a former minister… the embassy staff running intelligence ops? No, the Irish would never sit on this; they'd have looked for corroboration straightaway, gone for the jugular.
Kenyon shivered with an intuition that he was overlooking something. Was the inquiry a feint, to see what the Met would say? Kenyon's brain rejected that: the Combs character would hold up, that's why it had been picked. Newman could send a three-hundred page life story if he wanted; dental records, too. The documentation would be seamless.
But, for a few seconds, the doubt swept back, greater. He had a fleeting sense that something was moving by him, out of reach, a sluggishly moving tableau of events, inexorable, indifferent to his efforts to direct their course. Kenyon shook himself out of the drift of thoughts. He had been at work on this nearly fourteen hours. Was he losing his grasp of the events?
He picked up the print-out, folded it thoughtfully and left for Robertson's office.
'Has Moore drawn anything from the coppers over there?' Robertson asked.
'I'll be asking him that when he makes his call.'
Kenyon checked his watch.
'About another twenty minutes. I just have the sense that things might unravel there rather suddenly. Part of me says the Irish haven't twigged to anything, but then I keep coming back to the killing this morning. Ball. Damn, we don't have a way of knowing what's going on there yet. That's what has me on edge.'
'Anything from GCHQ on messages to their embassy in London about Combs?'
'SIGINT have heard nothing so far and they have all the codes. But their embassy here knows that their lines back to Dublin are not secure. I just have this vision of an Irish civil servant stepping off the plane at Heathrow with a diplomatic bag under his arm, full of what Combs was doing for us in Ireland. Yes, going to their embassy to plan how best to use it against us… Christ, when I think of Murray, I almost think we deserve to have this cock-up thrown at us-'
Kenyon fingered where he felt the light pulse, the root of a headache in his forehead.
'James, listen,' Robertson interrupted. 'I know we're asked to hold our nose on this and that it troubled you from the very start. It could be a tight situation, I know.'
Kenyon began pushing back his cuticles. He managed to disregard the tone of reprimand. He looked to his watch again.
'I don't want Moore at risk,' Kenyon said. 'He hasn't enough experience really. I want to pull him out. It's too damned volatile and we don't have reliable information about anything.'
Robertson remained silent while he let his glance linger on Kenyon's rising colour.
'So you're ready to advise activating an approach at diplomatic levels then, James? Get the Irish onside before something gives way that we can't control?'
'Yes,' Kenyon answered. He felt tired, deflated. 'At least then I wouldn't have to worry about Murray in Dublin botching our show and endangering our people.'
'Don't take it so hard, James. Our timing is not too far out of kilter. We have the Irish government slavering with reassurances about security for our embassy staff. After this assassination, I mean. You'll see to notifying Moore then?'
'I'll pass along anything he has,' Kenyon replied.
He felt suddenly disengaged from the whole business. Even the physical surroundings seemed to recede. He was in a building in London, getting ready to close the bag on an operation which hadn't produced. Nothing novel about that. He had fifteen minutes on his hands, without the slightest urge to do anything except sink further into the chair. It was a long time since he had had his knuckles rapped by Hugh Robertson. In a way which he couldn't quite understand, Kenyon felt pleased to have been angry and to have drawn Robertson's plangent response. He could watch the diplomats wince at having to curry favour with the Irish. This did not displease Kenyon as much as he would have expected. He tried to will his headache further away.
CHAPTER 12
The barman reached out over the clutter of bottles and glasses for Moore's money. The pub was full of smoke. The seats were long gone, occupied since early evening. Nearly everyone in the pub appeared to be drunk or at least well on the way to being drunk. Faces glowed with the heat and the beer. Raucous laughter, a shout, more laughter; eyes closed, laughing helplessly with mouth agape, teeth showing to the gums. Everybody was pissed, Moore decided.
He sipped at the beer before swallowing. Too fizzy for bitter, but nice, malty beer. His eyes stung from the smoke. A woman brushed against him as she followed another to the Ladies. No one could hear the television and no one was watching it. Four barmen skipped, reached, smiled and poured pints of Guinness while a constant stream of shouted orders, hand signals and winks kept them busy. Moore looked at the door where he had entered. There was no sign of the man in jeans.
He hadn't noticed until he was crossing the street from the hotel. Then there was the vague speculation, the itch which made him feel vulnerable. As though the street was broader, the traffic faster. Nothing at first. Moore set up his checks. Instead of going into the first pub, he broke into a stride. He headed for the canal bridge, which he had crossed this morning, and launched into a brisk walk down Leeson Street.
He remembered that Leeson Street turned into a one-way street as it neared that park, St Stephen's Green. If there was a back-up in a car, he'd have a long block to lose them, too. The shops were closed. He couldn't take up a surveillance point off the street without attracting attention. The evening was warm. Moore slung his jacket over his shoulder. He had twenty minutes before calling Kenyon. The stream of headlights flowing along Leeson Street surprised him. He hadn't thought of Ireland as busy.
There were two pubs opposite each other at the end of Leeson Street. Moore stopped by the traffic-lights and pressed the pedestrian button. He could not distinguish the man from the groups who were walking down the street toward him. He looked to the four corners of the intersection. Moore had passed no clear alleys or pedestrian ways. If he did have a tail, then the tail would know the streets, that Moore had no place else to go. If there was tandem surveillance on foot, it would be easy to keep him in sight anyway. Five minutes before calling Kenyon and he still needed to get change for the phone.
